home cooked dinners by the season

Butter Lettuce Salad with Red Pears, Roast Pecans and Gorgonzola

I have a little story to tell about the power of a good recipe, friendship and six degrees of separation.

Having been distracted these past few months with projects that have taken my creative energy away from my blog, I’d been feeling a fair amount of anxiety not having posted a new recipe in many weeks. Sitting at my desk, brainstorming recipes ideas for the coming months, I received a group text to my daughter and me from one of her best friends. It was a welcome interruption.

Eleanor’s text to us told the story of how her family used to do Thanksgiving with some of their closest family friends every year (her parents had known them since medical school and they ended up living next door to each other) who always brought the “most amazing” salad (the salad had become a fixture in their dinner tradition and she even explained how one year when their friend didn’t bring it, desperate, they ran out to the local fast food grocery market to attempt to get the ingredients.) The friend had recently moved to Arizona, so Eleanor texted her asking for the vinaigrette recipe because she could remember everything else about the salad.

So here is the cool part of the story.

Her next text to us was a screen shot picture of the recipe. I was speechless. It was a recipe of mine on my original cooking class stationery from over 20 years ago.

As I texted back and forth with Eleanor (and she texted back and forth with her friend in Arizona) we traced the recipe back to one of my very first cooking classes at a kitchen store in Seattle on Lake Union called The Galley Slave. I remembered it like it was yesterday as it was one of my first times leaving my baby son at night with a sitter and the inspiration for the recipes came from when I lived in Paris taking cooking classes at La Varenne. It was printed on the stationery I used for my first business right out of cooking school with a beloved pineapple logo, symbolizing hospitality and graciousness, a heartfelt reminder of how much I loved cooking and developing recipes for people.

All those years I had figuratively been in the kitchen with Eleanor’s family and we had never known it. What got me the most, was her next text “your touch is widespread – our holidays would have been different without this recipe”.

It was exactly the inspiration I needed sitting at my desk that morning.

I hope this recipe inspires you for an upcoming holiday gathering. Its colors are beautiful for this time of year and the soft texture of the lettuce along with the sweet, juicy pears, creamy and mildly pungent Gorgonzola cheese and buttery rich, crunchy pecans are epic. The recipe was originally written to be individually served on plates but I was inspired to do this picture the way Eleanor’s had always served it with the butter lettuce tossed with the vinaigrette in a large bowl and the ingredients arranged in descending circles on top.

The salad is simple and straightforward to make, but here are a few important tips. Wash, spin and refrigerate the butter lettuce at least one hour before serving the salad. It can be done the night before, if you prefer. Doing this makes the leaves crisper (by osmosis any water left on the leaves is absorbed during the refrigeration process). Buy the pears several days ahead to give them time to ripen. To test for ripeness on a pear, gently push on the stem end and it should slightly give. Roasting the pecans brings out their full flavor and is worth the 10 minutes it takes.

Lovely story Linda, reminder of what this season is all about. Kind of twist of fate to be reading this post while I am in the middle of making a huge batch of candied pecans for gifts & just happen to have several ripe Christmas pears on my counter just waiting for a great recipe
Have the happiest of holidays!!!!

It really is what this season is all about. And for me, what creating recipes is about, no matter what time of year. How perfect you were making a batch of candied pecans, I am glad the recipe came at the right time for you. Thank you for your comment, I always appreciate them. Happy Holidays to you!

I love this story and I’ll be adding it to our ChristmAs dinner for sure ! I love all the ingredients and can’t wait to taste the dressing ! I want to add my sincere thanks to you Linda for your delicious , healthy recipes . They have changed and enhanced our life and my family’s life . Many grateful thanks and Merry Christmas Linda !

You are welcome, Karen. Enhancing and changing people’s live with good recipes makes me so happy. It is why I do what I do.
Thank YOU for your positive feedback, it is so helpful and inspiring to me. Merry Christmas!

Unbeknownst to me, my sister made your salad for a holiday lunch yesterday. After I got home, I emailed her for the dressing recipe. She told me it was on your front page! I had to laugh as this salad is what I planned to bring on Christmas Eve and asked my daughter to make at Christmas. Definitely a keeper!

I loved hearing from you – it made my day. Especially that you are using my recipes and that you have passed them on to your friends. It makes me really happy to know your generation is cooking when I hear so often that take out and restaurant food have trumped cooking at home. Thank you for taking the time to comment!